Sepia Scenes and .... Quivel

And then
there was nothing
else.
Nothing
but
the man
and his music ...

"After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music."

Aldous Huxley

I used half sepia to draw all the attention to the man and his music.

Find more Sepia Scenes here.




And now, for something completely different.
Run!
Flee while you still can, and I'll seek a good hiding place.
For it's time for Dr John's Quivel
and Quilly's Three Word Challenge.
Bad poetry and rigamarole,
because there is a paucity of Quivel writers,
and I happen to be one of them ...
Don't take it too serious
I'm only in it
for the heck of it ...

Poetic drivel,
more specifically known as
Quivel,
lifts the spirit.

Also sprach Dr John.

No need for
a rhyme,
just go with the flow
and jot down a scribble.


An anopisthograph
of teterrimous
jargon
or perhaps if you're lucky
some mellifluous
parlando.

But be wary!
Quilly's words can be scary!

Zoilists
and under the weather
pettifoggers
could get
seriously aggravated,
and
irritated.

Their
sternutatory spasms
sternutations
volgivagant sneezes
aspersing
hitonious green dribble.


Enough of this nonsense,
this rigamarole
Basta,
ora basta!
Basta.

That's it.

Sepia Scenes Au Naturel

Today I wanted to find out what would happen if you turn a natural sepia,

.... into sepia.
I think I prefer the natural sepia. What do YOU think?


Find more Sepia Scenes here.

Sepia Scenes The Kiss

Almost Valentine's day ...




Do you see these two doves? Boring huh?
I made a series of pictures them. Well, ... to be honest, I thought they were going to ..um ... do "it" and I was ready to make full coverage of that event.
I stood there waiting with my camera, ... but in the end they did nothing. Duh!
And so I ended up with more than a dozen(!) rather boring pictures.
(! Hmmm, yeah I'm a very patient girl)

After all, they're just two doves up on a roof huh? Doing ... nothing?

Now this morning at breakfast I was wondering what on earth I'd have to come up with this week for my Sepia Scenes when the series with the doves crossed my mind.

So I opened my Corel Paint Shop Pro x12 and had a little fun.
I picked the cutest picture, "the kiss".
First I cropped it. Then I created a layer.
I used the time machine option for the sepia effect.
Which was nice, but I thought it looked rather plain.
Well you all know how I love to play with half sepia, so I removed the sepia from the doves with the eraser tool.
And this is the result. I uploaded the full sized picture, so you can click on it to enlarge it.



Happy Valentines Day!! Even though it's not quite Valentine's day yet!

For more Sepia Scenes go on over to Mary the Teach and visit the other players as well?

Sepia Scenes House in Normandy

I love creating special effects with half sepia.
I opened this picture with Corel Paint Shop Pro x12 and duplicated it.
I then used the sepia effect on this layer, and removed the sepia layer from the flowers
using the eraser tool.


Find more Sepia Scenes pictures here.

Sepia Scenes, An Experiment

For this week's Sepia Scenes I did a little experiment with this picture.


I wanted to see what kind of different moods the picture would get if I highlighted

... the people in the background ...

Or only the Ricard ...
Which makes it look like an advertisement, but I kind of like the effect on this one ...


Or the whole table ?
Which one do you prefer?


Find more Sepia Scenes here.

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday, my dear husband.
Thanks for all the happy years together.
For taking me places, and teaching me stuff.
Thanks for fixing my chairs and putting the garbage out.
For all the things you do for us.
You showed me the world beneath the sea
and many other beautiful places.
You stood up for me and you defended me when I needed that.
You worked night and day when things were rough.
You never introduced me as "your friend".
You love my daughter as much as you love yours.
And me for who I am, the way I am.
You supported me in everything I did.
Or wanted to do.
I knew I loved you the very first minute I saw you.

Happy Birthday!





Click here to see more Sepia Scenes

" Contrasts" Window Shopping for Sepia Scenes

Last Summer I was out on a photo walk in Antwerp, looking for some neat reflections.
I was "window shopping" on the Meir which is the main shopping street, when I saw this.
I thought it would be interesting to see the old house from across the street reflected in this shop window. The original antique (woodwork? I'm not sure? ) garlands incorporated into the modern architecture of this building also caught my attention. It took me a while to find the right angle and "frame" the house into the reflection on the window. I did not want any disturbing reflections of people other than the ones across the street. That is quite a challenge in a busy shopping street, but I was rather pleased with this one.

Using just a lit of bit of colour in a sepia is an idea that appeals to me a lot, and when I saw this picture, I wondered what it would look like if I turned it into sepia keeping only the reflection in the window in full colour.

So I played with it a little, and here is the final result ....
What do you think?
Which one do you prefer?

I used my Corel Paint Shop Pro x 12.
I duplicated my original, and used it as a background.
Then I turned the duplicated one into sepia, and then removed the sepia part with the reflection using an eraser tool.
The same technique I used on my "Christmas house" picture, remember?
So here it is folks, my sepia for this week.
Click on the banner or here to see more Sepia Scenes.

I would have posted this earlier, *whining* but Mr Blogger did not let me upload my pictures!

There, that said, over to the next topic, my picture of the day.
I'm still the one co-player in this challenge I think but I won't give up.
A picture a day is what I'm aiming for and I think it's fun. Time consuming, but fun.
I'll tell you more stories about that in tomorrow's post.
Anyway, today's picture was taken on Tuesday, I took loads of pictures on Tuesday and it would be a pity wasting them just because it's Thursday today!! Oops, am I bending the rules now?
I hope not. I had too much fun shopping and chatting and cooking with my daughter yesterday to worry about pictures much, I hope you'll forgive me?
At least I'm honest, right?
So here we go ...

Now how did that come about?
I'll tell you all about it tomorrow!

Oh yes, one more thing. The daily picture photo challenge hosted by Gail has a new name.
It's now called "Thru my Eyes 2009" Gail and I are having so much fun, why don't you join us?

When Sepia Scenes meets Ruby Tuesday

When Sepia Scenes meets Ruby Tuesday...
From the very beginning I have had fun with both photo meme's.
What I love the most is how Mary points out new photo shop techniques each week.
By doing so, she challenges us to try new things.
Now, some time ago Robin had a unique sepia of a twig with a drop of water in full colour
on her blog.
That inspired and intrigued me, and this morning I spent a couple of hours (!) trying to figure out how to get that kind of effect.


There, I think I did it...
You can click on it to enlarge it for better detail.
Now how did I do that?

I used Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo x12.
I copied the original picture, and worked on the copy.
I used the "time machine" option to get the sepia effect.
And then removed the sepia with the background eraser tool which made the reds appear again.
I saved the image and cropped it a little with Picture manager.
And then I used Photo Scape to frame and sign it.

Click here to see more Sepia Scenes pictures.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Sepia Scenes

This picture was taken last Sunday.
It is a view at "Kasteel van Zwijnaarde"
the restaurant where he had a delicious brunch.

I used PhotoScape to add sepia to this picture.


Click here to see more Sepia Scenes pictures.

Sepia Scenes

When I go for a walk in Antwerp I love to discover
the tiny streets, and I always remember to look up.
That's how I came across this window decoration.
What I don't like in this picture is this artificial buxus.
he colour of it is a real give away.
Adding the sepia solves that problem.

For this week's Sepia Scenes I used the sepia filter of Corel Paint Shop Pro x12.

I hope this little angel will take good care of my father today.

He is in the hospital having an operation.

Let's hope and pray everything goes well.

Please send him your good vibes today, ok

Visit other Sepia Scenes players here.

Sepia Scenes Sinterklaas

Do you remember the story of Sinterklaas I posted last Tuesday for Ruby Tuesday?
If you haven't read it yet, click this link and take a look. I'll wait!

Tuesdays post had my daughter in it, and this is me, age four.
I have tears in my eyes because I was scared to death of Sinterklaas.
I'll tell you what happened.
It was custom when I was little that Sinterklaas visited the homes
of the little ones in the street where I lived.
But Sinterklaas had been offered a drink in each of the neighbouring houses
and by the time he got to our house that man was drunk.
And so were his two assistants.

Sinterklaas asked if I had been good and my mother replied
that I did not always want to eat my soup. I hated soup when I was a kid.
There were two "Zwarte Pieten" (his black assistants)
and one of them threatened to wrap me in a newspaper,
tickle and tug at my toes when I was in bed at night
if I did not change my ways and eat my soup.
Now this may sound funny to a grown up, it scared the hell out of me.
I remember waking up screaming and having terrible nightmares after that.


Now this is not the drunk Sinterklaas, this picture was taken at a local store.
This Sinterklaas was very gentle, but as you can see ... I was terrified!


This picture is an original sepia.
I scanned it, and framed it with Photo Scape.


Go here to visit other Sepia Scenes participants.

Snowy Sepia Scenes

The last couple of years, it has barely snowed here in Belgium.
If it does, it only lasts a couple of days, and then it's gone ...
So last year we got none until the month of April,
when we got a white Easter instead of a white Christmas!
And now, winter has only just begun and it has snowed already.
For our country that's very VERY early in the season.
Anyway, weather has been behaving strangely all over the globe I gather, so ...




I took this picture last Sunday in my sister's garden.
She has a tiny but very pretty little garden
and I just had to take a couple of pictures there.

I thought this one would be perfect for a Sepia Scenes.

I used PhotoScape this time to turn it into sepia.
This free software program has all kinds of
interesting features to frame your pictures,
so I tried some stuff until I found what I liked.


Click here to see more Sepia Scenes pictures

Sepia Scenes, Music to my Ears ...

For this week's Sepia Scenes I'm sharing a picture I took
while on holiday in La Provence, France.
The first one is the original picture.
I usually try to avoid any disturbing items (such as street signs for instance)
when I take a picture. However, I did not have the nerve
to take this poor man's water bottle out of the way.
So I cloned the bottle out of the picture by using my Corel Paint Shop Pro x12.



There. It's gone!
Magical!



To make it look like this I used the photo effects sepia option.


For more Sepia Scenes, visit Mary the teach at Sepia Scenes.
She always has something interesting to show us.

Sepia Scenes Boats on the Canal

For this week's Sepia Scenes I used my Paint Shop Pro x12 again.
I played with the "old newspaper effect"
it's one of the tools in the artistic effects drawer.

I used some pictures I took along the canal where I live.





More Sepia Scenes can be found here.

Sepia Scenes

With all my heart.
Peace.



Sepia Scenes is a new photo meme created by Mary the teach.

She wants us to post any picture we want, just as long as it's sepia.
If you're not sure how to do it
just go on over to her blog and she will teach you.
Each week she gives us some interesting suggestions.



I found this feather near the pond with the geese in Lillo.
I made a macro shot, and then transferred it to sepia
I used the "time machine" on my Correll Paint Shop Pro x12


Visit the other Sepia Scenes players here.

Sepia Scenes My Favourite Witch

This is my second entry for Sepia Scenes.
I love this meme.
I love trying new things, and I find it very interesting to learn from others.
The teach not only publishes a sepia picture,
she also explains how she did it, and that's what so exciting about this new meme.

I used the "time machine" on Paint Shop Pro X 12,
there are some interesting pre set features there,
(I used the oldest one last Sunday on the Weekly Winners post.)
and I used the second one this time.



This is someone I'd like to introduce tomorrow.
She's my favourite witch and she has a very special place in my home at this moment.
After all, tomorrow IS Halloween, right?
So if you would want to get to know her just a little bit better,
just come back and read tomorrow's post, okay?



See more Sepia Scenes here, or better still ...
join us if you're interested!

Sepia Scenes Old School Building.

Mary the teach, the famous host of Ruby Tuesday
has come up with a new meme called Sepia Scenes.
Click on this link if you want to find out more about this exciting new meme.
I'm thrilled, I really like sepia pictures a lot!

This is my nephew playing with a girlfriend in front of an old school building.
By now, this old school building probably does not exist any more,
it was up for demolition a couple of months ago when this picture was taken.
I made a series of pictures on this charming old building, maybe I should post it someday.


Anyhow, this is my first entry for Sepia Scenes, but it won't be my last ...